Chapter 13

[NOTE: This is a typed tape transcript and has not been edited or published, as of August 1992. It is for reference use only. The interviewer's remarks have been omitted where not relevant to Osho's words]

QUESTION:* I WOULD APPRECIATE SHORT ANSWERS WHENEVER POSSIBLE. YOU DECLARED THE END OF RAJNEESHISM AS A RELIGION AND HAD THE BOOK ON THAT RELIGION BURNED IN ALL YOUR COMMUNES. WHY DID YOU DO IT THIS WEEK AND NOT LAST YEAR, AND NOT ONE YEAR FROM NOW?

A:* That is a question which is absolutely illogical. Whenever I would have done it you could have asked the same question: "Why now? Why not before? Why not after?" Everything happens in its own time.

I had no religion before I went into silence. I have never been in favor of any organized religion. The moment the truth is organized it becomes untrue. It is no longer spiritual, it becomes political. But because I was in silence for three and a half years, the people who were running the commune managed to create a religion which is a very human tendency. Man wants to be in some organization.

Alone he feels afraid. He wants to be part of a society, culture, religion, nation, civilization, but he does not stand on his own. He cannot declare his individuality totally free of all conditions. And that is my whole teaching. So it was basically against me that THE BOOK OF RAJNEESHISM and the idea of Rajneeshism and the idea of sannyasins being called Rajneeshees was created.

When I started speaking again, I became aware of everything that had happened in my absence, but I was waiting for valid proofs against the organization that had developed. I don't hold any post, I don't have any political power. My power is my love. I am not even a member of the commune. So naturally I had to wait, because if things have gone wrong... slowly they started coming to me, but yet there was no solid proof. People were poisoned, but the poison used was indetectable. Doctors said, "People have been poisoned but we cannot prove it.

Efforts have been made to kill, but because it is indetectable there is no way to prove it." So I had to wait, and as more facts started gathering, that every phone going out from the commune, coming into the commune, was being tapped, that every house was bugged, even my room was bugged -- then it was time, because now there were solid proofs. And because those people became aware that now I was collecting solid proofs, the whole gang of twenty people escaped. And because bureaucracy everywhere is slow, we have given them space inside the commune: the state police are here, the county police are here, the city police are here, FBI top officers are here -- but things are going so slow, as if they are giving time to the criminals.

They have not asked for an interview with me -- which should have been their first thing because I exposed the whole thing. They should have asked me, but they did not. I had to ask them, "Please have an interview with me." Four times they gave a date, a time, and four times they canceled it. This way they delayed again one week. The fourth time I told them, "If you cancel it, then this evening I am going to call a national press conference. I am going to talk to them, and I am going to say it clearly, that `these people are not working to find out the criminals; their strategy seems to be to protect the criminals and destroy the commune'." They would like somehow to arrest one thousand sannyasins who are absolutely innocent, who have not done anything; or even if they did anything they had no idea why it was being done. They may have carried some bags from one place to another place not knowing that the bags contained poisons. They may have dug ditches not knowing that those ditches were going to be used for bugging homes.

These people are innocent, and all the people who knew what they were doing...

they killed a man and threw his body out of Rancho Rajneesh; they tried to kill the three people most intimate to me who were a danger to them -- because they were my physician, my dentist, my caretaker, and they might inform me about things that were going on. They even tried some kind of poison in my milk. They never wanted me to speak again. They didn't have the idea to kill me; but they certainly wanted me to remain sick, weak, so that I could not come back into the commune and make Sheela's image as high priestess that she has created in three and a half years disappear -- because when I am present there is no need for any mediator between me and my people.

She insisted in many ways, "Your health is not good, and it will be dangerous to speak again. Everything is going well -- you need not bother, we are working perfectly well." "But," I said, "what am I going to do with my health if I have to remain my whole life closed in the room? My health has to be used for my people. If I live two years or four years less, it does not matter -- but whatever I want to do, I should do." That became a trouble in their minds, and they started arranging to escape, to get married in Switzerland. And they committed bigamy:

Sheela was married here to an American sannyasin, she got married secretly to a sannyasin in Switzerland; the Swiss sannyasin was married to an American woman here -- they both have committed crime.

But this all went on secretly, silently; only now are things surfacing. As they escaped from here, thousands of sannyasins started coming to the office and informing us of whatever they knew. They were fragments, but those fragments indicated many things, and all put together, it became a bigger Watergate. Even the FBI people had to accept it, that this gang has used more sophisticated instruments for tapping the phones, for bugging the houses, than Nixon had used. And Nixon has bugged only a few places, they have bugged hundreds of houses. For each bugging, a five-year punishment....

Q:* AN AMERICAN LAW?

A:* Yes. So if all these buggings are to be punished, at least one thousand years'

imprisonment will not be enough. And these people have done many more things... because one of them has returned. She did not go the full way to hide in the Black Forest, she returned from Seattle, seeing the point that rather than hiding her whole life as a criminal here and there, it was better to come back to the commune and confess everything that she had done and she knows. Perhaps today she is giving her testimony before the FBI. And she knows every single detail of how may people were poisoned, how many people were harassed so that they would leave the commune, for the simple reason that they were more intelligent, more independent, and they could not be enslaved. The chancellor of the meditation university left, the vice-chancellor of the university left, and hundreds of others who have been with me for years -- very intimate -- they all left. Not that they were against me. Now they are phoning from all over the word, "We want to come back. We never wanted to leave the commune, but we were harassed in such a way, humiliated in such a way, that we had to leave; there was no other way."

These people, because I was completely isolated and in silence, took advantage of the power. Sannyasins love me -- in my name these people were telling them to do things, in my name they collected money. Two hundred million dollars have been used in the commune, but forty-three million dollars they saved in a Swiss bank in Sheela and Savita's names. Her old secretary who is to reach here tonight -- or perhaps she has reached -- has revealed it, that forty-three million dollars what was to come here is waiting there. So they have done every kind of crime that was possible. And now they are lying to the news media.

If they have any courage they should come and face me and face the commune, and I guarantee that we will not do any harm to them. They can come and have an encounter, and if they have any allegations they should put them forward.

They had not even the guts to face me when they escaped -- they did not even come to see me to say goodbye.

Q:* COULD YOU IMAGINE A SITUATION WHEN YOU WOULD NEED SHEELA BACK, WHO AFTER ALL WAS NOT A BAD MANAGER IN BUILDING THIS COMMUNE? DO YOU EXPECT HER TO BE BACK?

A:* No. I will not have her in any way. But if she wants to come back, she can be just like an ordinary sannyasin. But she will not have any power post -- never.

And I will not need her. I have got so many intelligent people -- she is just a hotel waitress.

Q:* DO YOU HAVE A JOB FOR HER?

A:* Yes, in the hotel she can work. As a waitress she will be perfectly okay. But nothing more than that. Now I have got a better group of people -- more intelligent, more humane, more understanding, more democratic. And I am allowing every head of all the corporations to approach me. There is no need for one person only to approach me -- that was the danger. Now all the heads can approach me. Sheela had chosen all the heads, third-rate people who were below her intelligence. That is simple political strategy. Every politician wants people around him who are not competitors to him.

Those twenty people have escaped with her, and they will suffer unnecessarily. I would like them to come back. I have love and respect for whatever good they have done to the commune, but I cannot protect them against the law. They have to face the law. And it is better to be in prison for two, three years and come back clean, fresh -- we will be welcoming them, there is no problem -- rather than hiding in this place, that place, like thieves, criminals.... They will destroy their own being.

Q:* DO YOU THINK THEY KNOW THAT THE DOOR IS OPEN?

A:* They know me, that my doors can never be closed for anyone. If they don't know, you make them aware that the doors are open, and we will accept them without any condemnation -- that is the function of the law. We will respect them for all the good that they have done -- they have created this oasis out of the desert -- but for whatsoever crimes they have done they have to be responsible before the law. I cannot support anybody against the law. And it is good to go to the court and confess; you may get a little concession in punishment. And after the punishment you will come out far cleaner than after hiding. This hiding will make you more criminal.

Now the forty-three million dollars are there in the bank, but they cannot take them out because wherever they will use them they will be caught immediately and asked where they got forty-three million dollars. None of them is rich. None of them can manage to show from where that money has come.

Q:* BUT THEY ARE NOT THAT OLD. THEY CAN USE IT TO THE END OF THEIR LIVES.

A:* We will not allow that. My sannyasins are all over the world and they are watching their every step. The banks in Switzerland... my sannyasins are watching every bank, where these people go, what they are doing. We will not allow them... because that money belongs to German communes. It had come from Germany, it was to come here.

Q:* SO IT BELONGS TO YOU, OR TO THIS COMMUNE.

A:* Yes, it belongs to this commune or it belongs to German communes who had contributed, but it does not belong to any individual. This is theft, and we will not allow it. And we have our own means not to let it happen.

Q:* YOU DECLARED THAT MALA AND THE RED CLOTHES NO LONGER NECESSARY, THEY SERVED THEIR PURPOSE. WHAT WAS THAT PURPOSE, AND WHAT HAPPENED THAT THEY ARE NO LONGER A MUST?

A:* The purpose was... in India they were significant, because in India for thousands of years red has been the symbol of spiritualism, and I wanted to destroy that idea. I wanted my sannyasins to be as materialistic as they were spiritual. The dichotomy, the division between spirit and matter, between this world and that world, is against my ideology. I don't see any division. A man can live both dimensions fully. They are not opposed to each other; on the contrary, they are helpful to each other. A healthy man is capable of getting deeper into meditation than a sick man.

What does fasting signify? -- and all the religions have been teaching fasting. In India I have seen people who have been continuously fasting. In their eyes you don't see any intelligence, in their answers you don't see any genius speaking. In their faces you don't see any aura of growth, any luminosity, that they have arrived at something beautiful within themselves. All that you see is a very crippled, sick person. But he is worshipped, because he is fasting for days together; then he eats one day and again fasts. All his spirituality consists of committing slow suicide. I don't consider it spirituality.

So I wanted my people to wear the same red clothes and destroy the old idea that red clothes represent one who has renounced the world. On the contrary, red clothes represent one who rejoices in everything of the body, of the mind, of the soul. He is an organic unity. So in India it was significant.

But when I came to America I came in silence, and I remained in silence for three and a half years. I wanted this gap for my own health, and I wanted this gap also to get rid of those people who were only intellectually clinging to me. I have told them again and again, "I am not here just to satisfy your intellectual curiosity.

That you can do in any university, in any library -- I am not needed for that. If you want to go deeper than your intellect, if you want to go deeper than even your heart, if you are willing to reach to the very center of your being, then only be here; otherwise don't waste your time." But they became addicted to my words. Three and a half years' silence helped them. By and by, seeing that I was going to remain silent my whole life, now there was no point.... The people who were not addicted to my words, the people who were more in love with my presence, who were just happy to be with me -- whether I was silent or speaking was not the condition -- remained. This was one of the reasons.

The other reason was that I was speaking before on Jesus, on Zarathustra, on Buddha, on Krishna, on Mahavira -- almost all the founders of religion and all the great so-called religious people -- for the simple reason that everybody is already divided into some group. You cannot find fresh people anywhere.

Unless I speak on Jesus, the Christians are not going to listen to me. The moment I started speaking on Jesus, Christians started coming to me. Even Christian bishops told me that they have never thought that this much profoundness is there in the statements of Jesus. I was laughing inside, because it was just a strategy! Jesus' statement was there, but all profundity was my creation. But that was the only way to get people who can listen directly to me.

Now I have got enough people, one million around the world. And I want more people. That's why I am withdrawing all discrimination, so the people who want to hear me and want to be near me need not be worried that they have to wear red clothes, that they have to wear a mala. That creates unnecessary trouble for them: their job, their wife, their children, their parents, their society... and they become unnecessarily a laughingstock. There is no need. I am opening all the doors to everybody who wants to have a communion with me. That's why I have withdrawn every outer symbol. Now if anybody wants to keep it, it is his business. But from my side now there is no outer symbol. And everybody is welcome.

Q:* HOW MANY DISCIPLES WOULD YOU LIKE TO HAVE?

A:* It is not a question of how many. The whole world. I don't deal with small things.

Q:* CAN WE EXPECT SIMILAR SURPRISES IN THE NEAR FUTURE AS FAR AS THE ORGANIZATION OF THE BHAGWAN MOVEMENT IS CONCERNED? DO YOU HAVE ANY GRAND VISION, ANY PLAN FOR THE FUTURE?

A:* No, I never have any plans for the future: I simply live moment to moment.

So you can always expect surprises. If there is a plan, then there is no surprise.

But with me, because there is no plan, every day you can have surprises.

Q:* WHAT IS YOUR ANSWER TO THE RUMOR THAT SHEELA ONLY LEFT TO PREPARE A NEW NEST FOR YOU IN THE BLACK FOREST OR SOMEWHERE ELSE? SO TELL US, WHEN WILL YOU LEAVE?

A:* I am not going to leave America.

Q:* PERIOD?

A:* Really.

Q:* THE INS, ON THE OTHER HAND, IS KEEPING THE FILE ALIVE IN QUESTIONING THE LEGAL STATUS OF YOUR STAY IN THIS COUNTRY....

A:* For four years they have been keeping the file. Let them keep it! And I am waiting for their answer so that I can go to court -- because all these Americans are foreigners in this country.

Q:* EXCUSE ME, SIR, MAY I END MY QUESTION?

A:* No. That trick won't do with me... because I have been seeing that, whenever I touch something that touches your hurting nerve, immediately you start changing the question.

Q:* NO, I DIDN'T WANT TO DO THAT.

A:* Then why were you changing it?

Q:* I WOULD LIKE TO END THE QUESTION WITH THE INS.

A:* That's what I am doing -- ending it completely. I want them to decide, and those cowards have not decided in four years, for the simple reason that if they decide "yes," the political pressure is too much on them, they cannot decide yes.

"No" they cannot decide because they have no grounds for no. If they decide no, I go to the courts, up to the Supreme Court. And that's what I was saying, that I am going to say to the Supreme Court that all of you are foreigners in this country, invaders, talking of democracy, talking of freedom, talking of freedom of expression. If you really believe in your constitution, give the government to the Red Indians. And the first thing is, go back to your countries from where you come, because you have entered America without a visa and you have never obtained any green card. Your forefathers were criminals and you have to suffer for it, because if Adam and Eve are sinners and every Christian is still born in sin, what about Americans? -- only three hundred years have passed. And if you can sin for three hundred years... we have been sinning only for four years. So what is the point?

I want to fight it to the very end. Unless I have my green card, I am not going to move out of America. Once I have my green card, perhaps I may come to Germany, because I would like to have some fight with the German politicians. I love fighting!

Q:* I SENSE THAT.

A:* Yes!

Q:* BUT YOU OFTEN NAMED AN ELEGANT, SIMPLE AND FAST SOLUTION FOR THE INS THING, SO LET ME ASK YOU: WHEN WILL YOU MARRY AN AMERICAN GIRL?

A:* Not one.

Q:* HOW MANY WOULD YOU LIKE TO MARRY?

A:* I have asked them, that if one makes me capable of having one green card, it is simple arithmetic: I can marry one thousand American girls -- that makes me capable of having one thousand green cards, the only man in the whole world who has one thousand green cards. Really, the color green I love, and just one card I wouldn't like....

Q:* IF YOU WERE IN THE POSITION TO SET UP AN EDUCATIONAL PLAN FOR SCHOOLCHILDREN, WHAT WOULD BE YOUR VALUES?

A:* First, burn all history books, because history is all rubbish, inhuman; it consists only of Genghis Khan, Tamerlane, Alexander, Napoleon, Stalin, Adolf Hitler, Nixon. Burn it completely!

Q:* WHAT ABOUT RONALD REAGAN?

A:* He does not count at all -- not even worth burning. He will not be even in the footnotes of a history book.

Q:* SINCE SHEELA LEFT, THERE HAVE BEEN APPARENT CHANGES IN THE MOOD AND APPEARANCE OF THE COMMUNE. FOR INSTANCE, I DIDN'T SEE THE GUN PLACED IN THE WINDOW OF THE CAR FOLLOWING YOURS YESTERDAY. DO YOU LIKE TO SEE THE SECURITY FORCE THINNED OUT? WHEN DID YOU LAST RECEIVE A DEATH THREAT?

A:* It is coming every day, so there is no question of the last time. And I would like the security completely dissolved -- the government has to take the responsibility. If they take the responsibility that no nuisance is going to be done to the commune.... I am not concerned about my assassination. In fact, out of many ways of dying that seems to be the best. Ninety-nine percent of people die on their beds. I don't like that, it is too commonplace. In fact, I tell my friends, "Don't sleep in a bed, sleep on the floor. A bed is dangerous: ninety-nine percent of people die there. Avoid it!"

So I am not concerned about my assassination. I am concerned for my people, because when a security force was not there, fanatic Christians started coming and making a nuisance here, Hell's Angels started coming and making a nuisance here. We are not creating any nuisance for anybody; our people are not even going to any other place. Then naturally we had to have the security force.

And, strange, since the security force is here, those fanatic Christians have disappeared. They believe in the guns more than in THE BIBLE. And those guns have not been used, and I don't think we will ever use them. They are just to show up these idiots who call themselves Hell's Angels: it is enough for them just to see a gun. The guns are not for use.

But if the state is willing to give the guarantee -- which they should give.... But the reality is, the state itself wants to destroy the commune -- a peaceful commune which is simply working hard the whole day, dancing in the night, meditating in the morning, having no concern with the whole world, whether it exists or not. We have completely forgotten about it.

They have kept their national guards alert; not only that, they are accumulating their national guard in Madras so within an hour they can reach here immediately. All their vehicles are in Madras. For what? We don't have an army here, we don't have nuclear weapons. This simply shows them up as cowards, and these cowards are going to face the Soviet Union! A small commune of five thousand meditators -- and they keep their army alert, they keep their national guard alert. I am simply amazed! I had never thought that American have no guts. Adolf Hitler made a wrong move: rather than moving towards Russia, he should have moved towards America. These fools would have fallen on their knees and worshipped him as the reincarnation of the Prophet Elijah. He made a wrong move -- Russia is not the right place for anybody. If any other time Germany comes to that same strength again, America should be the target, because I am seeing here that they are such cowards.

I have been asking the governor to come here "and see of what you are afraid. Be our guest. Just go around the commune and see the laughing, dancing, joyous people you will never see anywhere else." Four years have passed: he hasn't the courage to come here. And he goes on speaking against us without knowing anything about us. Just the other day I was encountering the attorney general on television, and I told him, "We are not a religion and we have even burned the holy book of Rajneeshism, which was created by a criminal group while I was in silence. So withdraw your case against the city" -- because he has a case against the city, that religion and state are mixed. Now there is no religion, so there is no question of mixing. And he could not even answer. I repeated, "Your case has gone down the drain. Just come and see that there is no religion here, no church, no holy book, no catechism, no priest, no congregation, no baptism. Just come here and tell me: What is religion, that you find it here, which is mixing with the state? But -- no guts to come here, and all lying, continuously lying.

They did not allow journalists in the meeting where they decided to put the army on alert and the guards on alert. The governor said he would inform the press after the meeting, and after the meeting what he informed the press was absolutely unrelated to what happened in the meeting. Not a single word was in connection, it was absolute fiction that he said. In fact, contrary to what he said in his meeting, to the press he said that everything is calm and quiet and in control and there is no need to fear, then who is putting the army on alert? Inside they decide to put the army on alert, so that within three hours of any moment they can reach Rajneeshpuram. And then they alerted the national guards; not only that -- that was not satisfactory -- they are accumulating them in Madras. One of the journalists somehow found the confidential file of what had happened in the inside meeting, and he showed the file on television. From him we got a copy of the confidential file. These politicians are simply dirty dogs, not even worth being called human beings.

They are very much worried because we have two or three dozen guns -- which are not even automatic! And for four years nobody has used them, and perhaps if any time they have to use them I don't think they will be able to -- for four years they have been practicing, just to keep them. And what do three dozen guns mean to a country like America which claims to be the biggest world power? Seeing these people, I would like the Soviet Union to be completely aware that these cowards have no spine: don't be worried. I am not favorable toward communism, but neither am I favorable towards cowards. To coward I prefer anything.

Q:* SO HOW DO WE GET THE MESSAGE TO THE SOVIET UNION?

A:* That's your job. Okay? Good!

INTERVIEW WITH MARY THORNTON OF WASHINGTON POST, USA ANSWER:* Good evening, Mary.

QUESTION:* EXCUSE ME IF I ASK STUPID QUESTIONS.

A:* No, I love stupid questions -- you just start!

Q:* WITH ALL THE TURMOIL AFTER SHEELA'S DEPARTURE, WHAT WILL HAPPEN NOW TO THE COMMUNE, DO YOU THINK?

A:* No problem is there, no trouble is there.

Q:* YOU JUST GO ON AS USUAL?

A:* No, there is no problem and no trouble.

Q:* ARE YOU NOT VERY DISAPPOINTED IN HER?

A:* Not at all.

Q:* WHY?

A:* Why should I be? -- because I had no expectations in the first place. Nobody can disappoint me. For that you have first to have some expectations. When they are not fulfilled you feel disappointed. I never expect anything from anybody, so I never feel disappointed.

Q:* DID YOU NOT TRUST HER?

A:* There is no question.... These things -- trust, distrust, love, hate -- all these contradictions I have dropped far behind.

Q:* YOU JUST SAID THAT YOU'RE NOT A RELIGION. WHAT IS THIS THEN?

A:* It is a mystic commune, a commune of people who are individually searching and seeking their inner being. It is a way of religiousness, but it is not an organized religion.

Q:* WHAT ARE YOU TO THESE PEOPLE NOW?

A:* I am a friend, a guide, a philosopher.

Q:* YOU SEEM TO BE MORE THAN THAT.

A:* Certainly, if you love me a little bit, I look more than that! That "more" is in the eyes of someone who has love; otherwise I am nothing.

Q:* WILL YOU HELP THE FBI IN THE INVESTIGATION?

A:* I have invited them -- they are already working.

Q:* DO YOU EXPECT THAT THEY WILL CONVICT YOU OF SOMETHING?

A:* Whatever they want to do... they should just find the criminals, whoever the criminals are.

Q:* DO YOU THINK SHEELA COMMITTED CRIMES?

A:* Certainly.

Q:* DO YOU UNDERSTAND WHY?

A:* It is a human trait. Everybody lusts for power, but everybody does not have the opportunity: she got the opportunity. Millions of dollars she had never seen; millions of sannyasins who were ready to do anything that she wanted in my name.... And then she started thinking of herself as the successor or the chief priestess. These are just human frailties -- nothing to be bothered about, just ordinary qualities of human beings.

Q:* BUT IT SEEMS LIKE SOMETHING TO BE BOTHERED ABOUT WHEN YOU'VE GOT TO HAVE THE FBI AND EIGHT LAW ENFORCEMENT AGENCIES....

A:* No, I am not bothered at all. I have got all these people so that they can find out if anything criminal has happened; then I want that to be in their hands. I don't want to take the law into my hands, I don't hold any power. And I don't want my people to take the law in their hands. So give it to those... these are servants of the people; if some crime has happened here, they should clean the place. It is their duty, they are being paid for it.

Q:* SOME OF THE AUTHORITIES HERE HAVE NOT BEEN TOTALLY FAIR IN THE PAST. DOES IT NOT WORRY YOU TO HAVE THEM SNOOPING AROUND?

A:* No, nobody is preventing them.

Q:* BUT AREN'T YOU AFRAID THEY MIGHT USE THIS AS AN OPPORTUNITY TO COME BACK AT YOU?

A:* They can, because the people who belong to the FBI or the KGB are not different from people who are criminals. Their qualities, their minds, are similar.

The only difference is that they are paid by the government, and the criminals are like free-lance journalists. They can use this as an opportunity, but we will try not to allow them to use anything against innocent people. If I have committed any crime, then it is perfectly good: they can arrest me. But no innocent sannyasins should be harassed by them. I have made it clear to them that if any innocent sannyasin is harassed here, then all over the world all American embassies will be harassed by my sannyasins. Theirs is not going to be an easy job.

Q:* SHEELA'S BEEN ACCUSED OF SETTING UP AN ELECTRONIC EAVESDROPPING NETWORK. DO YOU KNOW WHAT SHE WANTED TO HEAR, WHAT IT WAS FOR?

A:* Only from hearsay I can say... because I don't come in direct contact with people, and for three and a half years I was not coming to any contact. I have just heard this, that one of our aeroplanes, a Japanese aeroplane, we returned. It was fresh, new, we used it for a few days, but many accidents were happening on that kind of plane all over the world. So before returning it... we have our scientists, and we told them to look at what was the reason why those accidents were happening only on that plane particularly. And it was a beautiful plane, everything perfect. Those scientists discovered that that plane creates a certain sound, and that sound stops the engine. That gave Sheela an idea that a machine can be created which can create the sound, and can stop anybody's heart. This I have heard; soon it will come before the government and before the court. But this was the idea, to kill a person without even touching him. The scientist refused, he said, "I cannot do such a thing." But he said it is possible. So Sheela may have been looking in other places with other people to find out how to create the same sound. And we have all kind of electronic engineers here, so it is not very difficult; they just have to know the exact wavelength of that sound, and a small box can be put by your side.... But she had a very criminal mind. This is absolutely criminal.

Q:* WHEN DID YOU FIRST REALIZE THAT?

A:* As I came out of my silence, she started to kill my physician.

Q:* DO YOU KNOW HOW?

A:* First she gave him some poison in a cup of coffee. Because he is a topmost physician, he immediately recognized that he had been poisoned. The medical center examined him -- he was sick, he was weak, his head was going beserk -- but they could not find any disease. They had only a suspicion, but no solid proof that he had been poisoned. Then the second time was when he was inside the nursing home, resting for three days. Puja, Sheela's assistant -- she is a nurse - - injected him again with the same poison, and again the same symptoms started.

But it is a slow poison; it does not kill you but it weakens you. It will kill you after six, eight months, so by that time it will look almost a natural death. The third time was when I was speaking in the morning discourse. Before ten thousand sannyasins, one of Sheela's gang pushed a needle into him and injected him. He immediately got up, looked, pulled up his robe and showed people:

there was blood, and there was a point showing a needle mark. And one sannyasin now has come up to say that he had seen exactly the same person whom my physician was suspecting, because she was just by his side at the moment he felt the prick. Shanti Bhadra is the name of the girl. He was taken sick immediately, but he refused to go to the nursing home here because again Sheela's nurse would be there. He went to Bend. There, two doctors said that it was an indetectable poison. And when Sheela left the house, she left literature on poison, literature on how to make bombs, literature on how to kill people; and in the book on poisons the only poison that is underlined is the same that all the doctors were suspecting.

Q:* WHAT IS THAT?

A:* I don't know exactly, but that is the poison which is indetectable. And it kills the person; if you give it many times -- it can be given in milk, in water, in food -- the person will become weak, he will die slowly. This was the last straw for me, and I started looking for more evidence, because even this was not evidence. If it is indetectable, then there is no sound proof to call the police or give anything to anybody. But the day Sheela left, the sannyasins who were afraid of her and her gang... because certainly she was killing, she had killed one person and thrown his body out of the ranch. And people knew it, that she had been poisoning three thousand Share-A-Home people who had been brought here.

Q:* WHAT WAS SHE GIVING THEM?

A:* She had brought them -- just now I have come to know -- to take over the county, because you need to reside only twenty-one days in Oregon to become a voter. So for twenty-one days they were all drugged, so the became almost zombies: whatever you said they would do. One of these street people got too large a dose and died on the spot. And for three thousand people for twenty-one days continuously being drugged, she had to bring gallons of drugs from outside America -- because if you purchase them in America then there will be the question: what are you going to do with them?

Now everything is being reported to the police. The only problem is that the politicians of Oregon are more interested in destroying the commune than in catching the criminals, so they are delaying the process. One girl who has been a central figure in this Sheela's group -- she was the one who drove the two people who burned the planning office in The Dalles -- knows everything that has been done, how they tried to poison the whole water system of The Dalles. Their whole idea was that on election day people would be so sick that they would not be able to go to vote. Sheela would have these three thousand zombies and three thousand sannyasins, and she would take over the county.

Now this girl is really brave -- her name is Ava. She has been saying, "I want to give all the details." She had left with the group but came back from Seattle. She had some consciousness, some feeling, some humanity. She said, "It is better to confess everything rather than to carry this load all your life and hide like criminals here and there." She said, "I am going back to the commune to confess everything."

Q:* SHE CAME TO YOU?

A:* No, she came to the office. She is here, and she has been asking.... They have been giving her appointments and canceling them. Today is her fourth day; perhaps they have kept her appointment -- perhaps not. And they are not willing to give her her appointment here. Strange, because all their top officials are here.

When you are taking everybody's statement here, why do you want Ava's statement in Portland? Perhaps you want somehow to change the statement, somehow to threaten Ava, or somehow to bribe her -- anything you can do. But I am making it public to the whole world. I will not allow these politicians to destroy the commune or harm any sannyasin.

They have done all kinds of crimes. All of the hotel rooms -- I think there are one hundred and twenty? one forty-five rooms in the hotel -- all are bugged.

Q:* WHO BUGGED THEM?

A:* Sheela and her colleagues.

Q:* WHY?

A:* Just so any officer staying there, any journalist staying there, anybody staying there... they were taping everybody, whatever was going on....

Q:* BUT WE'RE ALL SO BORING!

A:* It is boring, but for them it was significant. She bugged Hasya's whole house because she was afraid: Hasya was close to me, and Sheela was afraid that anytime I become aware of all the crimes I will tell her to resign immediately.

Then Hasya will be the person to take over. So she wanted to keep all the tapes for some future use -- tapes of whatever people were saying, whatever they were doing. She was tapping, bugging even my own room.

Q:* WHY?

A:* Now I can see the point. For example, she was asking for something...

because she was meeting every evening just the way Hasya does -- any secretary has to bring to me all the problems from all over the world communes, this commune. I see the point: she would be talking to me, and one in a while I was surprised that she would suddenly come very close to my chair; otherwise she was sitting as far away as you. Suddenly it was as if she was going to tell me some secret, but the reality was that near me was the microphone, which was hidden behind a switch.

She was insistent that I should have this switch here for the guards: if any emergency was there, then this switch.... But I said, "I will never see any emergency; all curtains are always drawn, and the guards are above my room -- they will be seeing everything before I do." But she insisted, so I said, "Okay, if you feel happy, put in a switch -- there is no harm." But the basic thing was, the switch had hiding inside it a very sensitive microphone, and outside in the guards' bathroom was kept the tape recorder. Now I understand what she could do with those tapes. She could ask anything and I could say, "This is perfectly good -- you do it." She might be asking about the road, "Should we make this road?" And I might say, "That's perfectly right -- you do it." Now those words would be on the tape -- they could be placed in any context. Unknown to me, later she might insert the question: "One hobo has died. Should we throw him out?" And my answer would be used: "Yes, it is perfectly good."

Q:* DOES SHE HAVE THE TAPES STILL?

A:* She has all the tapes there with her. Even before she left -- because she knew when she left she would be searched, everybody would be searched -- the tapes were sent before she desired to leave or told her friends that she was going to resign. So now she will be managing -- and those technicians are with her who had managed the whole mechanism of bugging, taping; now they can do anything with those tapes, they can put in my words for anything. It is simple, a very simple game, so she can blame everything on me -- that was the purpose.

She could say, "I want to kill Devaraj because he is dangerous to you and I have information that it is no good for him to be your physician. The only way to remove him is to finish him." She can put in her question and take any piece from the tape where I agree with her. So she can manage to make it seem that all the crimes that have been committed were committed with my consent, with my awareness; that I knew that the Wasco County was going to be taken over and this was why all those people were brought here.

She had told me that after our annual festival we had three million dollars'

surplus, so it would be a good thing to use that three million dollars for some humanitarian purpose. I said, "If you have more money than you need, then certainly use it." She said, "My idea is to bring people from the streets and give them a feeling of being human, dignified, respected, to have them live with our sannyasins: `Share-A-Home'." And I said, "That's perfectly good -- you do it."

Now I don't know what she can put in front of that. She can put, "I am going to give these people drugs and keep them drugged for twenty-one days," and after comes my statement, "This is perfectly good -- you do it."

Q:* DID YOU TALK TO HER ABOUT THESE CRIMES?

A:* For the last three months she had been avoiding me in every possible way.

The more I started knowing, the more she was avoiding me. One way was her saying that she had urgent work in a commune in Germany, in a commune in France, in a commune in Italy, in England, in Holland. She was roaming all over the world -- she just had no time to be here. And whenever she came she would remain here for two, three days, but she always had a cold. And because I am allergic, she would say, "Because I have a cold I cannot come to see you. When my cold is over, I will come to see you." But before her cold was over, she was gone. So for three months she had been avoiding me. Even when she left for the last time she didn't come to see me -- again, a cold. And she was informing me, "I will be staying for three, four days till my cold is gone, then I can come to you and say goodbye, and I am going." But next day she simply left, she didn't stay for three or four days. She never wanted to see me, because to come to me she would have to answer about the bugging, she would have to answer about the taping of every phone, she would have to answer about how that street person died.

I am still ready: if she has any courage she should come and just, before the commune, either she should prove that I am responsible for everything or she should confess that she is responsible for everything. But my feeling is that she is trying through the American embassy there to get immunity, and that's why these people are delaying the whole process. And once she gets the immunity, by that time she will have arranged all those tapes, and she can produce those tapes.

Then bugging is no crime because you have immunity, then tapping the phones is no crime -- you have immunity -- and everything you have done on my orders so I am responsible for it. But even that I will prefer to my innocent sannyasins unnecessarily being harassed; I can face the court. But their desire is somehow to create a situation in which they can arrest me and leave the sannyasins in a chaos. They are absolutely wrong. I have placed the right people in every place -- they will take care of the sannyasins. The commune is going to remain here.

America may disappear in the third world war, but the commune is going to remain here.

Q:* ARE YOU GOING TO STAY HERE TOO?

A:* Certainly. I am going to stay, and I am going to fight these politicians. I have always enjoyed fighting, because to fight for truth is such a joy. And I am telling my advocates, "Try to get permission so that I can fight myself. You can assist me but you cannot represent me. I am quite capable of representing myself."

Q:* I WAS GOING TO ASK ABOUT THE FINANCIAL STUFF, TOO. HAS SHE TAKEN LOTS OF MONEY?

A:* No, not from here. From here she has not taken a single cent. But she has already stopped money that was going to come here, which was coming from German communes as a contribution for this commune. She had put in a Swiss bank forty-three million dollars, and she had put it in her own name. We are not going to leave it there -- that belongs to the communes. Either it should go back to the German communes or it should come to this commune. But nobody can exploit sannyasins in such a way.

Q:* SO YOU'RE STILL FINANCIALLY SOUND, THERE'S NO PROBLEM?

A:* We are perfectly sound, there is no problem. In my whole life there has never been any problem. Financially, never, because I have loved so many people and so many people have loved me that finance is not a problem at all. If the people come to know that I have any financial problem, from all over the world money will start moving towards Rajneeshpuram. That is not a problem. Right now we are perfectly sound, so there is no question. And she has not taken anything from here.

Q:* IN HER INTERVIEW SHE HAS COMPLAINED ABOUT ROLLS ROYCES AND THINGS LIKE THAT. WHAT DO YOU THINK OF...?

A:* She is just lying. Those Rolls Royces sannyasins have presented to me, but I cannot accept any present for the simple reason that I don't own anything and don't want to own anything, so everything belongs to the commune. The commune has created a trust for the cars, so all those ninety Rolls Royces belong to the trust. All my watches that people have brought belong to another trust, but these are all the assets of the commune. And I have never asked her to bring anything to me.

Q:* SO SHE'S MAKING THAT UP? SHE'S JUST LYING?

A:* That's why I say she should face me. She is lying completely. And the only thing that she can do is play with those tapes and put things into them. I may have asked for something that I needed, any small thing might be needed -- "So you find it." She can arrange the tape and put "Rolls Royce" in it. And from the Jewelry Trust hundreds of watches have been given to the sannyasins, only a few watches are kept for my use. And when people bring new watches, then old ones immediately are given to sannyasins.

I had asked the car trust that these ninety Rolls Royces also be distributed to different corporations so sannyasins can use them, but there were problems. The first problem is that nobody is willing to take those Rolls Royces that I have been using; they feel it is sacrilegious. The trust does not want to give them away; they want to keep them as a memorial. And, moreover, all the sannyasins have enough cars. The percentage must be the highest in the whole world. They have one hundred buses, five aeroplanes -- and nowhere to go! If she wants, she should encounter me directly.

Q:* HOW DO YOU KEEP CRAZINESS LIKE THIS FROM HAPPENING AGAIN?

A:* Now I will be speaking, and I will be available. If I had been speaking and I had been available, this thing would not have happened at all. In thirty years in India it never happened. There was no reason for it to happen here.

Q:* WHY DID YOU STOP SPEAKING?

A:* It was just that I was tired. Thirty years of continuous speaking... four hundred books have been collected out of those speeches, and almost six hundred books must have been lost because some speeches have not been recorded. I don't think anybody has spoken so much.

So I was tired and I wanted to rest. My body was in a bad condition; my back was bad. Doctors, the best experts from England had come, and they all tried all their strategies and traction: nothing worked. They said that it is not an ordinary problem -- that some disc has slipped, so they can put it back. It is just my chair that I have been using for my whole life... it has slowly given my back a certain curve. That curve cannot be changed, so all that can be done is that I should not sit in any other position, in any other chair. So the curve is supported, that's why I am using only this chair everywhere -- the same chair and the same car, because only this one car has the same angle. I have tried all the cars, only one car has the same angle.

Q:* SO YOU JUST USE ONE CAR NOW?

A:* I use only one car. Those ninety cars are just one model, they are not different cars; that is just one model, the Silver Spur. And people who love me want to give something to me -- I don't have anything. I use at the interview and in the morning the watch and the car -- these are the only two things. So with one million sannyasins around the world, ninety cars means nothing. Soon you will see three hundred and sixty-five cars. Many are on the way.

Q:* WHAT MADE YOU START TALKING AGAIN?

A:* This situation.

Q:* SO YOU KNEW, YOU BEGAN TO SEE SOMETHING WAS WRONG?

A:* I started seeing it, because my caretaker was one day poisoned in Sheela's house. Sheela called her just to meet her there, gave her a cup of tea, and immediately she went strange. Something in her head started cracking, stretching; she could not walk. To show love and to show friendliness Sheela drove her back to my house and said that something had happened. But my physician was certain, "This is the same thing that happened to me with a cup of coffee; the symptom is the same." Then I said, "It is now time that I should start speaking and meeting people."

And that was enough: they escaped. They could not do anything; otherwise they must have had much in mind. When Hasya took over Sheela's place, her room, she discovered an underground room, a hidden tunnel which goes directly out of the house, and through which you can reach to the airport directly. You can keep the plane ready and you can escape any moment. Even if the police are around the house it will not make any difference. So she had much in mind -- because what is the need of keeping literature on how to make bombs? For what? One of our best pilots she suddenly sent to a German commune where there is no airport, where there is no aeroplane. It was a punishment. And the reason was -- when she left he immediately phoned that the reason was, "She had told me, `Take our biggest plane, fill it with bombs and other explosives, and crash it against the Wasco County office. Before the crash, jump out with a parachute so you save yourself -- but destroy the country office completely!" He said, `I cannot do that." Immediately he was put on a plane, sent away so he did not say anything to anybody. Now he is back, and I have said that he should give now the whole report.

She had in her mind many more things, it seems. If I had remained silent, then there would have been other plans also. But not much harm has happened, just a little bit which we will manage. There is no problem....

Okay?

Q:* THANK YOU.